Transcript
RAIDIX 4.4 High-Performance Storage Solutions RAIDIX 4.4 RAIDIX software is a unique development by RAIDIX LLC intended for creating highperformance storage systems using standard hardware components. RAIDIX is perfectly suitable for tasks with strict requirements for high performance, reliability and operational continuity owing to the unique proprietary mathematical algorithms and parallel calculations usage.
System Architecture RAIDIX 4.4 supports both a single-controller (one node is used) and a dual-controller (Active-Active) mode (Figure 2), when two nodes are active and have access to the same set of drives. The nodes are hardware-independent components of the storage system, which have their own processors, cache memory, motherboard, power supply units.
Figure 1 RAIDIX 4.4: Single-Controller Mode
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Figure 2. RAIDIX 4.4: Dual-Controller Mode
Duplication of Hardware Components RAIDIX guarantees continuity of data access and provides fault-tolerance due to:
duplication of nodes (including motherboards, cache memory modules, power supply units, SAS-controllers, system drives);
duplication of drive connection channels (both nodes are connected to one set of drives).
Nodes interact over InfiniBand, iSCSI (over Ethernet), LSI SAS, and Fibre Channel interfaces what let to synchronize data and caches state. Due to the standby cache synchronization in both directions, a remote node always contains an up-to-date copy of data in local node cache. Thus, if one node fails, the other node transparently takes the entire workload, allowing the administrator to fix appeared errors without stopping the system. Duplication of hardware components and interfaces provides the protection against the following failures:
failure of one of the hardware components (CPU, motherboard, power supply unit, controller, system drive);
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drive shelves` connection interface failure (SAS-cable, I/O- module);
power-off of one of the nodes;
occurrence of software errors on one of the nodes.
Network Attached Storage In RAIDIX 4.4 software is implemented an ability to work with Network Attached Storage – NAS. Network system architecture represents a NAS-server combined with storage system on RAIDIX platform and interacts with client computers via SMB/CIFS, NFS, FTP, and AFP protocols (Figure 3).
Main advantages of working with NAS on RAIDIX 4.4 platform include:
lower exploitation cost compared to SAN;
possibility of usage over the network;
possibility of file sharing - the simultaneous user access to large volumes of data.
RAIDIX 4.4 NAS functionality includes an ability to create and edit shares with adjustable parameters (path, protocol, access permissions, visibility and host selection).
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Figure 3. NAS Architecture in RAIDIX 4.4
Distinctive NAS Features in RAIDIX 4.4:
Clusterization: NAS functionality is supported both in single and dual-controller modes and operates in Active-Passive mode;
WORM (Write Once - Read Many) option for SMB shares: ability to prohibit file modification after its creation for a long period of time (5 years by default);
XFS and ext4 file system: ability to select the type of the file system in GUI;
Quoting support: ability to specify the amount of LUN size, available for the particular share users or user groups.
Active Directory While working with SMB shares, an integration with Active Directory is available. Active Directory allows several domain users or group of users to work with shares, assigning them different access permissions to the folder.
Clustering System Clustering system of RAIDIX 4.x generation software allows to create a faulttolerant high-performance cluster (by configuring dual-controller mode) and place C Copyright © RAIDIX, 2015
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arrays asymmetrically on the nodes. Each RAID can only be active on one of the nodes through which access to RAID resources is provided. Implemented system architecture:
increases fault tolerance due to automatic and manual nodes modes switching (Failover) (Figure 4).
Figure 4. Example of the Nodes Page While Performing Node Failover
helps to increase system performance due to ability to perform RAID migration from any node of the cluster to balance the nodes’ workload. During the RAID migration the array preference parameter (Affinity) changes, RAID becomes active on the other node.
Cluster-in-the-box RAIDIX 4.4 clustering system provides high availability of services and allows system administrators:
to install additional software that supports clusterization (for example, OSS Lustre: to interact with the Lustre file system, OSS Lustre must be installed on each node, with volumes available to OSS locally);
to activate or deactivate services on the nodes in accordance with cluster events.
RAID Levels RAIDIX 4.4 software allows creating the following RAID levels: RAID 0, RAID 5, RAID 6, RAID 6i, RAID 7.3, RAID 7.3i, RAID 10 and RAID N+M.
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RAID 6 RAID 6 is the level of interleaving blocks with double parity distribution, based on proprietary RAIDIX mathematical algorithms. RAID 6 is characterized by improved performance, since each drive processes the I/O requests (entries) independently, allowing parallel access to the data. RAID 6 can sustain complete failure of two drives in the same group.
RAID 7.3 RAID 7.3 is the level of interleaving blocks with triple parity distribution, allowing restoring data in case of a failure of up to 3 drives. RAID 7.3, based on proprietary high-performance RAIDIX algorithm, allows achieving high levels of performance without an additional load on the CPU. RAID 7.3 has a higher degree of reliability than RAID 6: 3 checksums are calculated using different algorithms, capacity of 3 drives (instead of 2 in RAID 6) is allocated for checksums.
RAID N+M RAID N+M is the level of interleaving blocks with M checksums, based on proprietary RAIDIX mathematical algorithm. RAID N+M allows user to choose the number of disks for checksums allocation. RAID N+M requires at least 8 disks and can sustain complete failure up to 64 drives in the same group (depending on the number of parity disks).
High speed reconstruction of RAID 6, RAID 7.3 RAIDIX 4.4 implements a high speed reconstruction of RAID 6, RAID 7.3 that runs up to 6 times faster in comparison to similar hardware controllers and without sacrificing performance. Reconstruction runs in background mode in case of one/two or three (for RAID 7.3) drives replacement, not affecting the client.
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SSD Cache RAIDIX 4.4 implements a mechanism of SSD caching that allows optimizing random read operations performance.
Write Through Mechanism RAIDIX 4.4 implements the Write through technique that allows performing write operations directly on the disks by passing cache. Only if the data is written on the disks, the host will receive the confirmation report. Write through practically minimizes the risk of data loss and it can be enabled by administrator in the GUI. Otherwise, the write back mechanism is used by default.
Cache Algorithms RAIDIX 4.4 offers a new effective replacement algorithm – Cycle that is adopted for the random write workload. Earlier, the system used the LRU algorithm by default that was more appropriate for the sequential write workload. So now, user can choose or change the cache replacement algorithm that suits their needs better! This option is implemented in the RAIDIX 4.4 GUI. Our R&D team is actively involved in new cache technologies implementation and RAIDIX is getting ready to offer the most effective cache algorithms with the possibility to enable it in GUI.
Silent Data Corruption Protection Silent Data Corruption can be caused by failures in drivers and drive firmware, memory errors, drive-head crashes and similar software and hardware problems. Silent errors occurred during write operations to the drive are the most hazardous, as they go undetected by drive firmware and host operating systems and may result in the corruption of data structure leading to the subsequent loss of data.
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RAIDIX implemented forward silent error correction algorithm that analyzes RAID metadata to detect and fix corruption while regular drive operations are performed, without performance degradation.
Partial Reconstruction Hard drives capacity growth and therefore slower drive recovery time lead to the increase of probability of drives failure and data loss risk. RAIDIX 4.4 has a mechanism of RAID Partial Reconstruction that allows restoring only a particular area containing corrupted data on a hard drive, reducing the array recovery time. Partial reconstruction is extremely effective for large arrays.
Advanced Reconstruction RAIDIX 4.4 implements the improved mechanisms of Advanced Reconstruction optimizing the read operations performance by eliminating the drives with the lowest read rates.
Permanently: system eliminates drives with the highest response time and solves the system of equations in the background to restore the data. The system stops sending read requests to those drives for a second and then, eliminates the other slowest drives.
On Demand: system determines slow drives in a group and stops sending them read requests. The data are quickly restored by solving the system of equations. The drives with the lowest response time are assigned a status Slow in the graphical web-interface and administrator is able to replace them quickly to return the system to its normal state.
Random Access Optimization Starting from the RAIDIX 4.4 system, we implemented the ability to create a volume with random access optimization (RAO), a technique that uses data deduplication. This volume is optimized for the following:
Work interactions with databases and transactional applications.
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Database and transactional applications are vast amounts of information obtained from a variety of sources – from mobile phones and accounting software, to various household appliances. After you apply RAO to such data sets, you will see a reduction in storage space allocated for archives of information from these sources. Using RAO, you can increase storage capacity by 2-5 times.
Data deduplication to save space on your drives and for virtualization. The basic principle for a virtual desktop deployment is to create an individual virtual environment for each user. This environment must include an operating system, data files, applications and settings – all that usually a physical working environment includes. If to take into account, that virtual desktop for one user can occupy from 10 to 20 GB, we can assume that the amount of free space in the storage can dramatically decrease after adding just a few hundred users. By using RAO (combination of deduplication and thin provisioning of resources), the amount of storage space allocated by virtual desktops can be reduced in 8 – 35 times.
Thin provisioning of system resources that does not affect the system speed, helps with more efficient volume management and allows you to eliminate the excess resources availability of the storage.
You can enable the random access optimization only on a separate volume type during the volume creation process. You cannot disable the random access optimization on the RAO volume you created.
Masking In terms of RAIDIX software, masking is a process of determining the level of host LUN access. Target Masking Rules allow system administrators to specify an iSCSI/Fibre Channel/InfiniBand/12G SAS target for a LUN; the LUN will be available to host through this target. Host Masking Rules allow to specify the host access to a LUN or manage host access to all LUNs simultaneously.
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System Monitoring Module RAIDIX 4.4 has an advanced functionality to measure real parameters of storage system performance using Statistics monitoring module, which helps to map up configuration, estimate and increase the performance both of the storage system itself and during the data transfer process. All information can be accessed via the GUI in real time. The module consists of two functional sections: Data Rate and Trace. Data Rate section provides detailed information on the system performance and allows making assessment of the data exchange rate using the charts Data Rate, Response Time and Transfer Size.
Data Rate Data Rate charts are useful tools for planning and monitoring the backup procedure, allowing to get real-time detailed information on read and write operations speed at different time intervals (last minute, last hour, last day). For example, Last Minute chart (Figure 5) provides the real time information on the data transfer rate for the last minute every second.
Figure 5. Last Minute Chart of Data Rate Section
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The vertical axis of the Chart displays the operations speed (MB/sec). The horizontal axis displays the data transfer time interval.
Response Time Response Time charts (Figure 6) allow evaluating the system activity of command processing at different time intervals (last/ this minute / hour/ day).The vertical axis of the Chart displays the number of executed commands. The horizontal axis shows where the time spent on command execution is located within a time range (in milliseconds, microseconds).
Figure 6. Response Time Charts Example
Transfer Size Transfer Size charts (Figure 7) show the amount of transferred data (in blocks) at different time intervals (last/ this minute / hour/ day) and are useful tools for planning and monitoring the backup procedure.
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Figure 7. Transfer Size Charts Example
All the display parameters on Data Rate section can be set through the following filters:
RAID – filter provides statistics for all/ specified RAIDs;
LUN - filter provides statistics for all/ specified LUNs;
Host Alias – filter provides statistics for all/ specified created Host Aliases;
Session - filter provides statistics for all/ specified established host sessions;
Target – filter provides statistics for all/ specified existing targets.
Trace Trace section is aimed at engineers, performing the primary selection of storage configuration and commissioning operations. The following information can be displayed on Trace page:
Specific request (entry);
All requests history;
1000 previous or next entries.
The information from these charts helps engineers to setup advanced system performance parameters:
LBA;
Transfer Length;
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Cache Access Time;
Command Execution Time;
Data Transfer Rate;
Command Transfer Rate;
Write Back;
Read Ahead;
Non Real Time Command;
Write Cache Saturation.
Drive Scan RAIDIX 4.4 implements functionality to scan drives of an array on performing read/ write operations. Scan results show the number of read/ write commands performed by the system at different time intervals. Analysis of the results allows indicating drives with low performance. The results are presented in the table (Figure 8).
Figure 8. Drive Scan Page. Read Scan Results Example
Read Scan and Write Scan results interpretation
When the scanning is enabled the information about the number of commands operated at different time intervals will be displayed in the appropriate sections of the Drive Scan page. For example, results of a Read Scan test in Figure 8 reveal that the drive in a slot number 1 has the best speed characteristics, as most of requests (3748) were performed within the shortest interval (0-24 milliseconds). Zero value C Copyright © RAIDIX, 2015
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of last columns (time range >50 milliseconds) for the drive implies that all requests during read operations were quick.
SparePools RAIDIX 4.2.1 implements a SparePool functionality. Administrator is allowed to create one or more SparePools and add one or several drives in a SparePool (Figure 9); one SparePool can be assigned to one or more RAIDs that administrator wants to protect with hotspare.
Figure 9. SparePool Section
Uninterruptible Power Source Configuration In RAIDIX 4.4 functionality to connect the system to an uninterruptible power source (UPS) is implemented. The option is disabled by default. UPS monitoring parameters can be configured through a handy widget in GUI (Figure 10).
Figure 10. UPS Configuration Widget
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Universal Host Type In RAIDIX 4.4 the system automatically specifies the default host type, providing LUN interaction with hosts of any supported operating systems. The functionality helps to reduce the probability of errors during the system configuration and connection of hosts.
QoSmic (Quality of Service) QoSmic service, implemented in RAIDIX 4.4, allows user to assign different priority for hosts in the system (Realtime parameter) according to the application type (critical, non-critical) running in the host.
Unlimited Logical Unit Size (LUN) LUN size is limited only by the size of the created RAID. The feature is required to store and process large volumes of audio/video data.
Surrounding RAIDIX Systems The RAIDIX 4.4 provides a whole picture of RAIDIX systems located in the same local network. This option is implemented in the RAIDIX GUI and allows a user to gather information on alerts, configurations, connection details and failover operations. This option allows to jump from one RAIDIX GUI to another.
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Figure 11. Surrounding RAIDIX Systems
New RAIDIX 4.4 GUI Facelift Starting from the RAIDIX 4.3.2 system version, we offer customers a new web Graphical User Interface (GUI) that provides better structure and more attentive visual interaction with the user (Figure 12). Extra RAIDIX 4.4 interface features:
4 supported languages: English, Chinese, Korean, Russian.
HTTPS securing.
Wizards that helps you to set up the configuration of the system, DC configuration, RAID arrays configuration, LUNs configuration and so on.
Access Protection (user authorization).
Independent of the operating system.
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Figure 12. The RAIDIX 4.4 GUI
Simplified Version Update RAIDIX offers the easiest way to update the system version from RAIDIX GUI (Figure 13).
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Figure 13. Software Version Widget
Product Characteristics Drives Supported SAS: 6 Gbps, 3Gbps; SATA: 6Gbps, 3Gbps and 1.5Gbps SSD: SATA 6Gbps, 3Gbps; NL-SAS: 6 Gbps, 3Gbps Operational Features RAID levels Max number of drives in one RAID Max number of drives in the system Max LUN size Max LUNs Heterogeneous System Architecture Support iSCSI Sessions supported Maximum number of directly connected hosts (depends on the hardware platform) Client OS support
Virtualization platforms support
High-speed channels support MPIO
communication
NAS protocols support Applications support Tested with
RAID 0/ 5/ 6/ 7.3/ 10/ N+M 64 2 No limitations 487 LUNs could be accessed simultaneously through all available system interfaces MPIO, ACLs, CHAP –authorization, LUN masking, СRC Digest 1024 32
Mас OS Х 10.6.8 and above, Microsoft ® Windows® Server 2008/ 2008 R2/ 2012, Microsoft ® Windows® XP/Vista/7/8; Microsoft Cluster Server, Red Hat Linux, SuSE, ALT Linux, Cent OS Linux, Ubuntu Linux; Solaris 10 VMware ESX 3.5/4.0/4.1/5.0/5.1/5.5/6.0; KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine); RHEV (Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization), Microsoft Hyper-V Server, XenServer Fibre Channel; InfiniBand (FDR, QDR, DDR, EDR); iSCSI; 12G SAS Mac OS X Lion 10.7, 10.8 in single-controller mode with Xsan component, Microsoft ® Server 2008/2008 R2/2012; Microsoft ® Windows® 7/8; VMware ESX 4.0/ 4.1/ 5.0/ 5.1/ 5.5/6.0; Linux: (including but not limited) Red Hat Linux, SuSE, ALT Linux, Cent OS Linux, Ubuntu Linux; Solaris 10 SMB/CIFS, NFS, FTP, AFP StorNext, MetaSAN, Lustre, FhGFS, GPFS, CXFS, Hyper FS AJA, Matrox, Final Cut Pro, Blue Fish, BlackMagic, Iridas, VeeamBackUP, NetBackup, FalconStore, Adobe Premier
Administration and Management
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RAIDIX 4.4 Product Features UI Authorization Remote access Information on sensors Notifications
Multi-language intuitive management Web-interface User name and password HTTP, HTTPS, SSH Controller and enclosure E-mail, UI hardware failure notification
Other Warranty Support
Software Update
Optional extended warranty One year of basic technical support service is included with license purchase Optional extended support is available Free within the technical support period, or can be purchased separately beyond the support period
Contact Us To get in touch, please use the appropriate links below.
Learn more about us: http://www.raidix.com
Email us:
[email protected]
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